Post #142: Butterflies, Buttercream, and Birthdays!

Today was my dear little neighbor's, Audrey, 6th birthday party. Today was also my precious baby girl's, Gabby, numero uno, the big ONE, birthday! Yes, my baby girl is just 17 years away from leaving the nest.

So, the exciting part was I made the cakes for both occasions.

Here is Audrey's butterfly-themed cake. Once again, my lovely assistant and daughter, Savannah, helped me create this whimsical cake.

From Butterfly Cake

It was made using Wilton's cupcake cake pan and Dorie's Devil Food Cake recipe. We surrounded the big cupcake with little cupcakes and decorated with silk butterflies from Hobby Lobby's floral section, fake greenery, and fondant roses.

My little girl had Dorie's Perfect Party Cake. It was a small 3"X2" cake. I only did a two layer cake. It also was a copycat version using Duncan Hines' white cake mix spiked with lemon zest, lemon extract, and lemon juice to help give it a similar taste to Dorie's amazingly moist white lemony batter recipe for this cake. In our excitement, I forgot to take a picture of the baby's cake! BUT, we did get this shot.

From Butterfly Cake

She loved it. We did, too. Our version had no coconut, but I did manage to take bites of Gabby's,whose did. Both were very light and lemony. It is a Perfect Party Cake. My hubby really like it a lot.

Well, my hubby is home early because he is here to say goodbye to his grandfather who passed away a few days ago. We will be traveling to attend his funeral and memorial services, so I may not be able to blog for a little while.

It is so easy to forget how special life is until times like these, birthdays and funerals.

Life is truly special and worth remembering, so are the people who make it so.